Select Local Merchants

Customize a birthday cake or cookie at local favorite Patrick's Bakery Cafe.
Patrick's Bakery Cafe will keep those with dietary needs happy with a menu filled with gluten-free and low-fat items.
Find time to peruse the wine list here — Patrick's Bakery Cafe offers a variety of drink options.
Both the young and the young-at-heart will dig the family-oriented menu and ambience at Patrick's Bakery Cafe.
Patrick's Bakery Cafe is the perfect spot to enjoy a great meal outside (weather permitting).
Whether you have a group of five or a group of 20, Patrick's Bakery Cafe can seat both large and small groups.
Shake off the stiff workday duds at Patrick's Bakery Cafe — attire is casual.
Carry-out is also available for those who prefer to enjoy Patrick's Bakery Cafe's cooking from the comfort of their own home.
Catering from Patrick's Bakery Cafe will take your party to the next level.
Save some dough on parking at Patrick's Bakery Cafe.
Patrick's Bakery Cafe is a mid-priced establishment, with the average meal costing under $30.
Patrick's Bakery Cafe offers a wide variety of payment options, including payment by major credit card.

Barbette has a romantic ambiance and a fine selection of French fare.
The menu at Barbette does not include any low-fat options, so come ready to indulge.
Barbette's fully stocked bar is a perk for patrons who enjoy a fine wine (or more) with their meal.
Sit outside when the weather is fine — Barbette has a lovely patio to enjoy a warm day.
Complimentary wifi is available as well.
Folks tend to dress down at Barbette, so keep comfort in mind when heading to the restaurant.
Impress the patrons at your next gathering by calling in Barbette for catering.
You can also grab your grub to go.
In addition to street parking, there is a lot right around the corner, so finding a space shouldn't be an issue for drivers dining at the restaurant.
You'll typically spend about $30 per person to dine at Barbette, so plan your budget accordingly.
Stop by for three square meals a day — Barbette serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Located in La Belle Crepe, La Belle Crepe's crepes have a gooey inside and crisp outside.
Dieters beware — La Belle Crepe does not offer low-fat cuisine.
La Belle Crepe is great for families with kids.
Access the internet free of charge via La Belle Crepe's complimentary wifi.
Dine out in the open during La Belle Crepe's summer season when patio tables are available for use.
Your pooch is also welcome at the restaurant.
You can also grab your food to go.
Street parking is provided for those dining at the restaurant's Nicollet Mall location.
Prices don't get much better than this, either, with typical meals running under the $15 mark.

If fine food and refreshing beverages are on your to-do list, check out Colette bar and bistro in Minneapolis.
No need to miss out on Colette bar and bistro just because you are avoiding fat or gluten. The restaurant has loads of options that can accommodate your dietary needs.
Unwind with a glass of wine or cocktail with your meal — Colette bar and bistro has a wonderful selection of drinks to accompany your dinner.
Bigger groups gravitate toward Colette bar and bistro, which offers a private section for your next get-together or celebration.
Sit outside when the weather is fine — Colette bar and bistro has a lovely patio to enjoy a warm day.
The restaurant has wifi on hand for a nominal fee.
Colette bar and bistro welcomes laid-back diners, so there's no pressure to throw on heels or a tie.
Getting your food to go is also an option.
Looking for something delicious to serve at your next party? Colette bar and bistro also offers catering.
Valet parking is a nice perk for diners at Colette bar and bistro's W 78th St location.
Prices at Colette bar and bistro typically stay below the $30 mark, so you can afford to bring along a friend or a date.
Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are all available at Colette bar and bistro.

A must-have for creme brulee lovers, Vincent - A Restaurant serves delicious French fare.
The menu at Vincent - A Restaurant does not include any low-fat options, so come ready to indulge.
The drink list at Vincent - A Restaurant has everything you need to complete your meal (and your night out).
Vincent - A Restaurant is great for big groups, and visitors favor its private room for important events.
During the summer months, don't miss out on Vincent - A Restaurant's outdoor patio seating.
Get online for free courtesy of Vincent - A Restaurant's wifi.
If you're hoping to make a smashing impression at your next soiree, you can also have Vincent - A Restaurant cater for you.
If time is of the essence, Vincent - A Restaurant's take-out option may be a better fit.
Hand your keys to the valet driver, or pull into your own space in the neighboring lot. Street parking is also an option.
A night out here can be a bit pricey, so prepare to shell out a bit more.
The restaurant serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but it's the dinner menu that really draws the crowds.

For fine French cuisine, La Belle Vie is a magnifique choice.
No need to miss out on La Belle Vie just because you are avoiding fat or gluten. The restaurant has plenty of options that can accommodate your dietary needs.
Enjoy a drink with your dinner — La Belle Vie has a full bar to serve up a glass of wine, beer, or more.
A great space for entertaining large parties, consider reserving the private room at La Belle Vie for your next big event.
Be sure to call for a reservation if the restaurant is part of your weekend plans — it can get crowded on Fridays and Saturdays.
Patrons have the option of feeding the meter at the nearby street parking or taking advantage of the restaurant's valet service.
La Belle Vie can be pricey, so plan accordingly.

Groupon Guide

For centuries, humans have turned to food in an effort to spice up their love lives.But can aphrodisiac foods really increase your sexual appetite? Spoilsports such as The Journal of Sexual Medicine and the FDA say it’s not possible, but Appetite for Seduction's Shani Delamor disagrees.
The self-proclaimed Sexy Living Diva and her husband teach couples how to use aphrodisiac foods to reignite the spark during intimate Manhattan cooking classes. While Shani explains why certain foods are thought to be aphrodisiacs, couples sip wine and create romantic dinners full of arousal-boosting ingredients.
Here's how to create one of Shani's sexy meals at home.
Course One: Roasted Asparagus with Hollandaise SauceWhy It's Sexy: Asparagus is the key ingredient here. French couples used to dine on three meals of asparagus the day before their wedding in an effort to increase their libidos for the wedding night.In addition to its phallic appearance, asparagus contains energy-boosting nutrients and aspartic acid, which neutralizes excess ammonia in the body. Excess ammonia can lead to fatigue and sexual disinterest.
Course Two: Crispy-Skin Salmon Fillets with Honey Onions and SpinachWhy It's Sexy: The second course boasts honey, salmon, and strawberries. Honey contains boron, a trace mineral that increases the level of sex hormones in the body, as well as nitric oxide, which is released in the blood during sexual arousal.“We use salmon because it's from the sea and blessed by the god of love,” Shani said. Venus is also associated with heart-shaped strawberries, whose shape make them perfect for feeding significant others.Course Three: Fonduta di Cioccolato PiccanteWhy It's Sexy: This dessert incorporates chocolate, coffee, and red-pepper flakes.“Chocolate is actually a legit aphrodisiac, not just a fable,” Shani said. The famous aphrodisiac contains the neurotransmitters serotonin and anandamide, which contribute to feelings of euphoria during sex.Coffee, along with chocolate, contains caffeine, a stimulant that increases heart rate and blood flow. It also may give you the energy to have sex. Red-pepper flakes are made from chili peppers. These stimulate endorphins, increase heart rate, boost blood flow, and make you sweat, mimicking a state of arousal.
Photos: Green Asparagus by Sharon & Nikki McCutcheon under CC BY 2.0; Salmon Dinner-2 by Gwen under CC BY 2.0; Chocolate Frosting by Marcy Leigh with text added under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0Check out some related reads:How to Make an Adrenal-Gland Cookie for Your LoveWhy give a gift from the heart when you can give one from your real love epicenter: your adrenal glands.The Sexy Vegan on the Sexiest Foods Around
Blogger Brian L. Patton (aka The Sexy Vegan) definitively determines the sexiest fruit, spice, utensil, dinner date, and other sexy food items.

If you’ve eaten at a restaurant any time after 2010, there’s a good chance you’ve photographed your meal or eaten with someone who did. Even if you haven’t gone out to eat since 2010, you’ve probably seen a lot of #sundayfunday Instagram food pictures.
That was the year that launched Instagram and its legion of amateur food photographers, spawning a thousand think pieces on subjects ranging from fully experiencing your meals to the importance of throwing your phone in a river.
For a fresh perspective, we talked to Patrick Sheerin, who knows the Instagramming-your-food trend from a different angle. As a chef and partner at Chicago's Trenchermen, he not only cooks photogenic burgers like the one below but is an avid Instagram user.
What role does Instagram play at the restaurant?
Trenchermen regularly updates its Instagram account. “It’s a great way to be like, ‘Hey, look at this new dish at the restaurant,’” Patrick said. For example, the restaurant dolls up its beer-and-a-burger special for a photo every Wednesday.
Chefs don’t fuss over every dish like it’s headed to a modeling gig, though. Most pictures are taken on the fly, something fellow Instagram users appreciate. “People like that it’s in the moment.”
Trenchermen’s diners are also welcome to take photos, provided they don’t get carried away. “We have had a few people that have asked … to come back to the kitchen where there’s more light,” Patrick said. “How about I send you a picture and you just have a good time?”
Why do people like sharing Instagram food pictures?
Anthony Bourdain once answered this question. “It’s not to share. It’s to make other people feel really bad,” he said. “You don’t want people to be eating dinner with you when you Instagram a picture of your food. You want them to be eating a bag of Cheetos on their couch in their underpants. It’s a passive-aggressive act.”
Patrick sees things differently. “I’m much more of an optimistic person, so I would hope that’s not the case. I would hope that it’s because you want to share your experience with other people.” At worst, he said, it might be a substitute for chatting with friends about your meal after the fact—save time, blast it out on Instagram.
Why do people like looking at Instagram food pictures?
This one struck Patrick as pretty simple: food can be beautiful. “The prettier it looks, the more delicious it looks. It’s enticing,” he said.
Beyond its beauty, food photos’ resonance is unique. Because everyone is hard-wired with the drive, when people look at a stunning photo of food, they have a physical reaction. “You’re like, ‘Oh my gosh … I’m getting hungry.’”
Is there a downside to this trend?
Patrick is no Luddite, but he is a little nostalgic for the pre-Instagram era. “Dining out, at least to me growing up, it was always a treat,” he said. Today, some people dine out because they want to take photos, not to enjoy a meal with someone.
“It’s hard to get that back in the frame, that dining out should be a treat,” he said, “when you’re focusing on taking pictures versus the experience of being out.”
Is there an upside to this trend?
Restaurants absolutely benefit from the trend. “It can be hard to get people to read content,” Patrick said. “But Instagram can be visually arresting.”
It also helps diners, who can use think of it as a prettier and more succinct version Yelp—a place where users can quite literally picture new restaurants and their cuisine. The best part? There are no rambling stories allowed!
Patrick thinks Instagram can be helpful for home cooks, too. “What’s going on now in a restaurant, a couple years down the road, people start to experiment with those sort of flavors [at home],” he said.
Instagram makes culinary trends more accessible. For example, now that you know what they look like, it’ll be easy for you to make the leek terrine or steak tartare in the photographs above.
Probably.
Photos in top image also courtesy of Trenchermen’s Instagram
Take a look at related reads from the Groupon Guide:More Photos of Trenchermen—This Time, We Examine Its Bloody MariaDressed in a garnish crown of onions, salami, and peppers, this tequila-based brunch cocktail packs a punch-you-in-the-face kind of spicy.A Brief History of #FoodPornA blogger spent $143 at McDonald’s to build and eat a giant tower of fast food. He was called a symbol of modern American excess—but he’s just the latest in a long line of indulgence.

In this installment, Groupon’s food correspondent the Picky Panda talks to renowned pastry chef, cook, author, and French food expert David Lebovitz. His most recent book, My Paris Kitchen, bookends recipes for multi-course French meals with stories straight from the city of love. The Groupon Guide had already consulted him on some obscure French cooking facts, but the Panda was itching to know more. PICKY PANDA: Let’s say I’m an American who has never tried French cooking. Or, let’s say I’m a large bear who doesn’t know what France is. Is there an easy way to incorporate French cooking philosophy into my routine?
DAVID LEBOVITZ: Well, French cooking is really about building flavors. It’s not about complexity, it’s about heating the butter with shallots, frying them, getting the flavor out, adding the food, cooking it with salt and herbs … building flavors, rather than just putting stuff in a pan and cooking it.So, a lot of the best French food is not difficult at all, it’s very easy. Things like coq au vin, chicken with red wine sauce, or the mustard chicken that’s on the cover of my book ... you sautée these ingredients, and then you put them together and simmer them. I think that’s something that we lost. Lots of people want to steam vegetables, [and that’s] very easy, but often not very tasty.
The crock pots that are so popular these days in America, it’s actually braised cooking. You put everything in and let it simmer. Whereas the French would sautée the onions first, and so forth.
It seems like a lot of it relies on classic, surprisingly simple methods. But are there any new trends in French cooking right now that you’re excited about?
I think there’s a movement with younger chefs to be more exploratory, and to use ingredients not traditionally found in French cuisine. To be more vegetable-friendly, and to create more vegetable-centric cuisine. And I think that’s really admirable! There’s a lot of [chefs doing it]. There’s Gregory Marchand at Frenchie, there’s Bertrand Grébaut, he’s the chef at Septime. They’re doing very modern but clean French food.I love vegetables! Well, I love one vegetable in particular. But more on that later. My Paris Kitchen is your first book to incorporate savory recipes—you’re usually a sweets kind of guy. How did that make your process for writing this book different?My Paris Kitchen is a much more linear story. It’s a story about my life in France … the whole idea of a multicourse meal, which is very important in France, helped keep the narrative for the book going. It was very easy to start with appetizers, main courses, salad and cheese, and dessert.
People still eat in courses [in France]. Even at home. I have friends who are half my age, and they still eat their meat first, and then they have vegetables, and it’s kind of funny. I’m like, “Couldn’t you just put it all on the same plate?” And they’re like, “Oh, no no no.”
I don’t own plates, but I hear they’re awesome. Speaking of awesome, My Paris Kitchen contains stories as well as recipes. Were there any awesome stories that you wish had made it in, but didn’t?
There’s one that I’m not allowed to share. My editor wrote in the margins, “Too much.” I did include [most of] the story—it was about a cake I had while I was at a nudist island. I hate to say “clothing-optional,” but I don’t know how you say it in English. I talked about how much I liked the dessert I was having, and my editor crossed out the reaction I had to it and said it was too much. That’s why writers have editors.Okay, my last question has to be: how would you put your own spin on bamboo? I really think I’m going to try something new this time.I’ve actually cooked a lot of Asian food in my life, so I’ve had bamboo shoots and so forth. What I would do is sautée them with chicken, and some lemongrass and ginger, of course, and do a really nice stir fry.
About the Picky Panda:As a giant panda, I eat up to 30 pounds of bamboo a day. But after I got a job writing for the Groupon Guide, I found out that not everyone eats bamboo exclusively. (And that not everyone is a giant panda! Geeze!) Now, I’m on a mission to learn all I can about the world of food, cooking, and restaurants by talking to some of the greatest culinary minds of our time.Previous Picky Panda Talks:Kristy Turner, the vegan author behind the blog Keepin’ It Kind and the cookbook But I Could Never Go Vegan! Dan Raskin, co-owner of Chicago’s iconic Manny’s Deli